


Resistance is Futile

by likeadeuce



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-10
Updated: 2009-12-10
Packaged: 2017-10-04 08:19:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likeadeuce/pseuds/likeadeuce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Wesley and Cordelia had made different choices after Graduation Day at Sunnydale High?  Wesley is having some angst, but Cordelia's powers of persuasion are, well, persuasive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Resistance is Futile

Wesley did not want to go back to the empty apartment. As long as he stayed in the sterile confines of the hospital room, he could deny the completeness of his failure. There was no need to look at the rack of sharp suits he had bought for a job he didn't have anymore. He didn't have to stare at the collection of books that he had assembled with great enthusiasm, that had turned out to do absolutely no good to anyone in the fight against the mayor. He didn't yet need to see the way his answering machine was not blinking with messages that wouldn't be there from concerned friends and family – who, apparently, weren't that concerned.

He wasn't hurt badly, of course. Considering all the terrible things that could happen to a man who was fighting a giant demon and a veritable horde of vampires, a broken ankle and a sprained back qualified as more embarrassing than painful. Still, the injury required an overnight stay in the hospital, and it earned the half-hearted collections of flowers that sat on his endtable. Two vases had come with Buffy and Willow, when they paid a brief visit, accompanied by Mrs. Summers. Wesley supposed that this was simply a sign of Joyce's good breeding, and he should have been grateful for the polite conversation, as well as the tea she brought. But her presence made the girls' visit seem like more of an obligation. Although Buffy was perfectly civil, and Willow was as sweet and funny as always, they said their good-byes with a visible sense of relief. An obligation discharged, and they never had to see Wesley Wyndam-Pryce again. He watched Buffy's hastily retreating form and thought, "There goes my slayer, then. So much for that sacred duty."

Then it was Giles's turn to come in, wish him well without looking him in the eye, and apologetically thrust a letter into his hand. He tried not to hover as Wesley read it silently: "Be informed by the enclosed that the Watcher's Council no longer has need of your services. Effective May 25, 1999, your status as active watcher has been terminated on the grounds of gross and overwhelming incompetence. The disciplinary committee is currently drawing up charges on the following grounds: 1. insubordination, 2. disclosure of private council information to unaffiliated and potentially hostile parties (e.g., the vampire Angelus), 3. failure to disclose said disclosures to appropriate Council personnel, 4.misappropriation of funds, namely: a. exceeding wardrobe allowance; b. charging personal entertainment costs to official expense accounts; c. charging personal expenses to Council credit cards. 5. Failure to maintain an atmosphere of proper respect and discipline, 6. Conduct unbecoming a Watcher and an Englishman."

Underneath the typewritten note was an addendum scrawled in a hand that Wesley recognized as Quentin Travers' own: 'The Watcher's Council does not run a dating service, Mr. Wyndam-Pryce! Furthermore, it has come to our attention that the family of said "date" is currently under investigation for major tax fraud, meaning that your little indiscretion may lead to a large-scale audit of Watcher's Council financial records. It is only my tremendous respect for your father that causes me to advise you that you may tender your resignation and avoid the possibility of further disciplinary action."

Wesley had read the letter under Giles' gaze, then crumpled it in his hand. Without looking up, he said, "Would you describe Quentin Travers' sentiments toward my father as anything approaching 'tremendous respect.'?"

"Honestly?" Giles asked.

Wesley looked up and saw the older man's mouth twitch. "Yes, honestly."

"Honestly," Giles said, leaning down close as if hiding the information from people who would actually care, rather than the indifferent passers-by of a not-too-private Sunnydale hospital room. "Any respect that a Travers shows to a Wyndam-Pryce is widely believed to originate from compromising photographs taken on an International Sorcery junket to Havana in 1957, and stored somewhere in your father's vast library." And then they laughed together for a moment, and then Giles left.

But as much as the perfunctory visits from the others hurt, as painful as it was that his parents hadn't called – well, not hearing from Cordelia at all was simply a gratuitous blow. Having to deal with the slayers and Giles and the Council and his family – that was all a given. He had brought Cordelia and the associated pain upon himself. There was so much that he had a duty to care about. What business did his stupid heart have going where it wasn't wanted? And it was pretty clear by now that he wasn't wanted. He might have managed to impress her, a little, as long as he kept his hands to himself and didn't try to express the emotions she stirred up in him.

But then that morning in the library – first, he had hardly managed to string together enough words for a coherent sentence. _You do the_ Times _ crossword in a different language every Sunday, just for the challenge, but faced with Cordelia Chase, you suddenly have a problem with words._ Then on top of the minor verbal embarrassment, he couldn't even seem to kiss her properly. It wasn't as though he didn't know how. And he had years on her: she was barely eighteen, he was almost thirty. He should have been more of a man than any man she had ever kissed, if only by virtue of being able to grow facial hair reliably. But even though Wesley knew he was much older than Cordelia, he simply didn't _feel_ any older. There was something about being in that place, surrounded by the impenetrable, almost tribal, hierarchies of an American high school.

As different as Sunnydale was from his own British public education, with its relatively visible systems of advancement and patronage, there was something about being here that made him work obsessively at trying to plug himself into the school's social network. _I would have been much less cool than Buffy, at the top of the same classes as Willow but too shy to speak to her. Oz would have been too busy in his own guitar-guy world to notice me – when I tried to teach myself an instrument, it was the bloody sitar and damn George Harrison for making me think that was a good idea. Xander would have made sarcastic remarks that went over my earnest and literal head, and would have spent a lot of time fantasizing about kicking my pretentious little ass. And Cordelia? Good Lord, Cordelia Chase would have looked at me like I was something stuck to the bottom of her very impressive shoe._ But in Sunnydale she leveled those doe eyes at him and, ignoring the fact that everybody else's eyes were rolling, said, "I think we all need to listen to what _Wesley_ has to say." Each time she looked at him like that, blinded by -- what? His suits, his hair, the appearance of wealth, the slightly exotic accent? – part of him wanted to scream at her, "Can't you see what a tremendous fraud I am?" He knew he was putting on a front for all of them, of course, but Cordelia was the only one he was tempted to tell.

And so when he kissed her, Wesley didn't feel like a strong older man putting his arms around a girl and taking the opportunity to teach her things with the benefit of his experience. He felt like Hampshire's clueless, virginal little Head Boy, 1987 edition, laying hands on a woman who, with the power of the sacred vessel that she surely was, should have struck him dead then and there for presuming to touch her. And so they said their good-byes, and it didn't surprise him when she didn't call for him in the hospital. It was time for good-bye to all that, too.

*

Wesley called a cab to take him home. The streets of Sunnydale were surprisingly empty – or maybe not so surprising, considering the whole giant snake and exploding high school phenomenon of a few days before. What really should have surprised Wesley about the town, honestly, was that it had any inhabitants at all. He didn't know where he would go next, but he wasn't going to be one of the people who stayed here. A Hellmouth had its attractions if you were in search of evil to fight. But at the moment, what had a greater attraction was going some place where nobody knew him at all. He didn't have much money, but he could trade in some of those suits to buy a motorbike and criss-cross the American West as a – yes, a rogue demon hunter. He could even put it on business cards.

He was hobbling up the stairs to his apartment, lost in thought about what the cards should look like, and whether Steve McQueen or a young Brando would be better to play him in the movie. And while he was lost in this extremely vivid fantasy, he almost tripped over Cordelia.

"Hey, watch it, brainless!" she griped. Then she looked up, registered who he was, and quickly shifted into a dazzling smile. "Hi, Wesley!" She scrambled to her feet and started to smooth down her skirt.

"Cordelia?" he said, puzzled, working his key in the lock. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"Well, I couldn't let you just slip out of town like a thief in the night. Because Angel did, you know, and I thought if we ended up two heroes down – so where have you been? Don't tell me you've got a secret girlfriend, because that would totally mess with my plans."

Pushing open the door, he pointed to the walking cast on his right foot, and suggested, "The hospital."

"Oh God, you'd think somebody would tell me these things! Does it hurt much?"

"Only when. . ." he said, just as she reached down and poked his knee. "No," he gasped, steeling himself against the blinding agony. "Quite a minor wound, just a precaution."

He stepped through the door, but Cordelia hung back. Peering at the interior through the door, she said, "Can I come in?"

Wesley opened his mouth to say, "Yes," then thought something really must have gotten into his brain. He hadn't seen Cordelia since a graduation ceremony that had, after all, been overrun with vampires. A sick feeling rose in his stomach, but he moved quickly into the apartment, and his mind raced for the location of the nearest weapon. He reached into his coat pocket for the cross he always kept close to his heart, and. . .

Cordelia walked across the threshold. "If you're gonna be so stuffy, I don't even know why I bothered to ask." She made herself immediately at home on his sofa while Wesley, though still in pain, stood by slightly stunned. "You like movies, don't you?" Cordelia asked.

"Yes, well. Some of them, sometimes. It depends. I was just thinking about _The Wild One_, or possibly _The Great Escape_. . ."

She waved a hand dismissively. "I don't know what all that's about. But did you ever see _Say Anything_?"

"I can't say that I did."

"Lame movie," she pronounced with the air of an emperor judging the fate of a gladiator he hadn't been particularly fond of.

"I'm glad you brought it up."

"The movie starts with a high school graduation, the normal snakeless kind. And it's mostly about this loser who doesn't know what to do with his life, like Xander Harris with the whole see-America-in-my-uncle's-POS, how long's that gonna last? But I've been thinking about this movie a lot."

Wesley nodded. What else was he supposed to do? "Because of the graduation?" he ventured. "Or Xander, or. . .?"

"The loser likes this girl," Cordelia went on. "Whiny little do-gooder type. But nice hair. And her dad is one of those over-involved needy compensating for all the crap I did to your mother when she was alive kind of widowers, and you think, oh sweet, only it turns out he's a criminal, because he's cheating on his taxes, and his ass gets _thrown in jail_. Well, it turns out? Except for the whiny do-gooder thing? My life is just like that movie."

"Yes," Wesley said cautiously. "I have heard about your father. I'm very sorry and . . ."

"In the _end_ of the movie," she continued, and Wesley wondered exactly why he was trying to pretend that he was a party to this conversation rather than an audience. "She gets her happy ending and goes off to England with the loser. And so I was thinking," she flicked the hair off of her neck to let Wesley get a good look at its full gorgeous sheen. "I have the great hair and the felonious father. Why shouldn't I get the happy ending?"

"The ending. . ." Wesley said. "Where you go off to England with a loser?"

"Oh, no, Wesley! No one would ever mistake you for a loser."

"Well. . ." _I've got a nasty letter from my former employer, and unreturned phone calls from everybody I ever met that say differently_, he thought, and then _Just shut up for once and let the girl have her illusions_. "No. Of course, never. But Cordelia?" he said, reluctant to shatter her hopes. "I can't take you to England. Even if . . ." Well, there was no question of wanting to, was there? He imagined walking into his father's library with Cordelia on his arm, and the subsequent process of scraping the old man's jaw off the floor. And then he heard the words the way Buffy would have said them: _Shallow much_? He had to snap out of his pleasant but ridiculous reverie to say, "I doubt if I shall even be able to return to England myself in the immediate future. I am afraid that I am no longer employed by the Council, and the expense of even one return ticket, much less two. . ."

Cordelia pulled an envelope out of her bag and tossed it to him. "Done!"

"Done?" he repeated in disbelief. "How . . .why?"

"Well, it turns out? These IRS people might want me to testify about how Dad's been spending his money. And, well, with the money he has left, he thought it would be a good idea for me to be, what did he call it? Out of the jurisdiction until the time of the trial. And of course, I didn't want to go alone."

"Cordelia," he frowned, "What are you asking? Does your father actually approve of sending you out of the country with a man he's never met?" Opening the envelope to look at the ticket, he said, "Or, a better question. How exactly am I supposed to pass as 'Harmony Kendall'?"

"All right, okay," Cordelia said. "Harmony was supposed to go on this trip with me, but she disappeared right after graduation, like the spazz she is."

"Cordelia! You realize that probably means that she died at the hands of a vampire or some other horrible demon."

"Oh," she frowned. "I didn't really think of it that way. I guess that makes this invitation slightly more creepy, but. . . You still know people in England and stuff. Right?"

"And stuff," he sighed. "I suppose, perhaps. . . " He turned to stare at her. "Exactly what kind of arrangement are you proposing?"

"Calm down, buddy," she said. "I'm not proposing anything. There is no kind of proposal or proposition or any props of any kind. I'm talking about a strictly ladylike arrangement. I get you home and, once we get over there. . . . well, I don't exactly have a lot of money to live off until I get a job, but, I thought maybe I could go to London and try to be a singer? Or an actress? And you can help me find a way to make a living . . .actually, I guess we both need to find a way to make a living and. . .well, what else are you going to do? Stay here and ride around the country on a motorcycle looking for demons to kill?"

Wesley smiled. "That would be a ridiculous idea, wouldn't it?" He looked down at the ticket again and repeated, "Harmony?"

"Oh please," she said. "Wesley's practically a girl's name anyway."

"When you put it that way." He looked at her carefully, felt again like he was the stammering schoolboy and she the worldly Mrs. Robinson. "How could anyone possibly resist you?"

Cordelia shrugged. "Don't ask me. So far? Nobody has."


End file.
